the Army boy, for the stranger was
a white man, doubtless an American.

At the stranger's belt hung a holster, the flap unbuttoned. He was
wild-eyed and breathing hard, but there was no sign of cowardice in the
man's sternly set face.

Bloodstains showed over three wounds in the trunk of his body. The right
shoulder, also, had been touched.

"I can walk--but give me your arm," gasped the wounded man. "Take me to
your commanding officer!"

Hal started, but had not far to go, for Captain Cortland was coming
forward on the run.

"Take that man to the porch of barracks," called the captain, whose eye,
practised in wounds, saw much. "Don't make him walk far."

Kelly sprang to Hal's aid. Between them they lifted the wounded stranger
to a seat on their arms. The man put his arms about their necks, and
thus they conveyed him to a broad armchair on the porch.

"My man, there, run for a hospital steward," shouted Captain Cortland.
Then the post commander came to the wounded stranger.

Now that he found himself at the end of his journey the stranger
appeared to lose rapidly the strength of his voice. He lay back in the
chair, his eyes half closed.

"Where do you come from, friend?" asked Captain Cortland.

"The Seaforth Plantation."

"I know where the place is--twelve miles from here, in the interior,"
answered the captain.

"Right," murmured the wounded one.

"Your name?"

"Edwards. I'm bookkeeper and correspondent for Mr. Seaforth."

"Platoon fours right, march!" sounded from the parade ground.

Edwards heard the command, then the steady whump-whump of the feet of
marching men. The wounded man turned in his chair and gazed at the
detachment marching away in quick time behind Lieutenant Holmes.

"You act quickly, Captain," murmured Edwards gratefully.

"Those men are marching to Bantoc to keep order in the town," replied
Captain Cortland. "Tell me, as quickly as you can, what is wrong at
Seaforth's."

"We were attacked just before daylight this morning," Edwards replied
weakly.

"In force?" pressed the post commander.

"Just at a guess there must have been two or three hundred of the Malay
fiends."

"Any of the defending party killed?"

"Not when I left, Captain. But four of our native Moro laborers were
shot dead before they could reach the main house. The main house was
being defended by Seaforth when I left."

"How many white men there?"

"Seaforth, his son, his superintendent and a blacksmith